Verifying the Translation

I wondered if other verses in the Bible teach that matter changes itself. Peter wrote that gold perishes in I Peter 1:7. Everyone knows that gold does not corrode. Yet Peter puts the verb perishing in the present participle middle voice. The present tense means that it is a fact that gold corrupts. The participle is like the “ing” ending in English. The middle voice means that gold is acting upon itself. Peter says gold is continuously corrupting itself right now. Yet scientists have never measured any changes in the ductility, specific gravity, mass or conductivity of gold. The idea that gold could be corrupting itself, even though experiments do not detect it, is nonsense to scientists. Why did I find it so difficult to accept the simple literal meaning of the Greek text? Why did I insist that the words of the Bible must conform to scientific methods and definitions of mass and conductivity? Oh Lord, open my eyes that I might understand your truth.

Paul warned that philosophy and the world’s elementary ideas (Colossians 2:8) can capture us. Did the Greek philosophers originate the idea that matter does not change? If they did, it would support my translation of II Peter 3:4. I decided to read the writing of the founders of science to find out what they based science on.

The Greek philosophers set out to invent a scientific way of thinking. This was a radical task because the first assumption of that era was that everything deteriorates. When Pharaoh asked Jacob how old he was, his answer was in keeping with the thinking of that age. Genesis 47:9 “And Jacob said unto Pharaoh, The days of the years of my pilgrimage are an hundred and thirty years: few and evil have the days of the years of my life been, and have not attained unto the days of the years of the life of my fathers in the days of their pilgrimage.” Notice that Jacob does not say “my ancestors lived longer.” His father Isaac actually lived five years longer than his grandfather Abraham. Yet Jacob’s days of his years were insignificant and worse than the days of the years of the lives of his fathers. In the Hebrew, Jacob repeats the word “yowm” (days) four times. In Jacob's way of thinking, even the days and the years continuously deteriorate. The genealogies of Genesis show that the first patriarchs matured slowly and lived much longer that we do.

The pagan traditions also told of a golden race that lived long ages. Hesiod, a Greek poet who lived before the philosophers, wrote that the first humans were not affected by wretched old age. Their hands and feet remained unchanged until at a great age they died in their sleep. The next generation, according to Hesiod, played at their mother’s knee until they were a hundred years old. Upon reaching adolescence, they lived but a little time. According to Hesiod, each succeeding age lived shorter lives. He lamented that he was born in the iron age, the fifth race. It would be better, he moaned, to be dead than to live in this short, brutal age. He predicted this era would end when children are born with gray temples. Ovid, another pagan poet, wrote that the present oceans were not in place during the days of the earliest peoples. The climate was springlike all year long and there were no laws or governments. To summarize, ancient people believed that the essential nature of reality continuously deteriorates. They also believed that great cataclysms periodically ruined the earth.

It is impossible to invent a scientific way of thinking when the prevailing reasoning is that everything in every way is changing. The Greek philosophers struggled trying to find a solution to the elementary assumption of that era. Their debates went on for several generations. Aristotle, like the other philosophers, tried to find a way around the idea that everything changes. His solution was the very idea that Peter predicted for the last days. Aristotle wrote that we must simply assume that the properties of matter do not change. He invented the assumption that matter does not change itself. It is no accident that Aristotle invented logic. There is no basis for a logical way of thinking in a universe where every physical thing changes.

Eight hundred years ago the Catholic scholastics of Western Europe discovered Aristotle’s writings. One of them, Thomas Aquinas, successfully promoted Aristotle's system. The newly formed Western universities used Aristotle's idea that matter does not change-itself as the foundation for Western science. I concluded that my translation of II Peter 3:4 is supported by the evidence of history. It would seem that Peter and Paul both warned us about the same elementary ideas.

The final proof of a prophetic interpretation is its literal fulfillment. If my interpretation is valid, and we are living in the last days, then this should be the primary assumption of our day.

1. Many Bible scholars believe we are living in the last days.

2. I noticed that this assumption today has the status of a first law. No one questions or debates whether the properties of matter are emergent. This idea controls the way we think, measure, experiment and especially our earth-histories. Yet we are usually unaware of this assumption because we accept it as self-evident.

3. This elementary idea is subtly taught in all Western schools without being debated. Our concept of time, our way of measuring time and matter, our mathematics and laws of science all presuppose that matter is not continually changing itself. Yet we can see the past with sight and all ancient matter shines and moves differently than modern matter. This assumption is certainly the most important principle in Western science.

An elementary idea invented by a Greek philosopher controlled how I thought about physical reality. I had always accepted this little assumption as self evident and never questioned it. It was so basic and so much a part of my way of thinking that I was not even aware of its existence.

I only knew how to think according to the elementary idea invented by a pagan 2350 years ago. How could I free my mind from this little assumption? Oh Lord, free me from false principles and show me the true principles that govern your universe.

Next Section - My Quest for Truth

This document is under a Creative Commons License by Victor McAllister.
What does that mean?
Last edited 10/23/2008